Miss Austen - Gill Hornby Page 0,32
ran on; her voice was distracted. “If I am to finish this before we are all weddings and departures…” She looked up and smiled at her sister. “How I shall miss you, my dearest.”
“And I you.” Cassy swallowed hard, turning her eyes back to her needle. “It will be strange for us at first, I do not doubt. But then, this is something that most sisters must go through, must they not? And they seem to survive, somehow.”
“Most sisters? Is that how you think of us?” Jane was all playful outrage. “Then forgive me, Miss Austen, for my previous intimacies. I had mistakenly assumed myself of somewhat greater significance.”
“Oh, Jane!” Cassy looked up in horror. “You do know—”
“Yes, I do.” Jane softened. “Of course I do. And it is for love of you that I am rushing this composition. I am sparing you agonies of dismay and frustration. For how could you bear to be dragged off to wedlock without hearing this piece of perfection through to the end?” For a moment, she gazed out of the window; then she turned her eyes back to the page.
Cassy held up a needle. “Dearest, you have brought me such ease in this difficult period. As have the Bennets, of course.” She spoke through the thread between her lips. “It really has been most diverting.”
“And that is most gratifying to hear.” Jane bowed her head in acknowledgment. “For what do I live but to divert?” She drew a firm line with a flourish and collected the paper. “There. I have finished the chapter. Would you like to hear it now, or wait for the drawing room later? I shall not be offended. I know full well you cherish the invisible stitching on your own undergarments over anything my poor pen can produce.”
“Is it the ball? At last!” Cassy leaped up from the floor with a squeal. “Now! Please! I could not possibly contain myself all throughout dinner.” She took the chair next to Jane, fixed her eyes upon her. “Quickly, before we are disturbed.”
Now laughing, now gasping, Cassy listened in the warm, little dressing room with the blue-and-white-striped wallpaper: utterly, transfixedly, consumed with delight. Though when Jane read, in her best Mr. Bennet voice—“That will do extremely well, child. You have delighted us long enough”—she was moved to protest. She did not want any sort of interruption, yet interrupt here she must.
“Oh, Jane. Does she have to be called Mary? She is so perfectly dreadful. And our Mary believes she has a beautiful voice. We should go carefully. It will not go down well when she discovers it.”
“But how could she discover it? Our new sister has limited literary tastes: if it is not by her husband, then it cannot be good. A remarkably singular position to hold.”
They both giggled. The subject of James’s poetic endeavors was one they could only laugh at in private. “She certainly never sits still long enough to listen to anything I have written,” Jane went on. “As soon as we begin, she is checking the weather and telling James they should leave. Or suddenly remembering some item of news or an inquiry she has for our mother.”
“Perhaps, well—it appears to me, and I do have some sympathy—she does not feel fully comfortable here when the family is in full flight. You do not appreciate, Jane, how blessed you are, being so clever with words and able to provoke laughter in any company. Your gift comes too easily.”
“But she has been coming here, and sitting with us, as our friend, for so many years! I have never noticed her terrible discomfort before.”
“But—could it be?—she feels a new need to shine in front of her husband, and that is hard for anyone to do in a room full of Austens,” Cassy countered. “Now she is of our family, she perhaps feels her disadvantage more keenly. Since her marriage—”
“Oh, marriage!” Jane retorted. “Marriage! Always the excuse for all failures of character. One does so long for it to bring some improvements, but more often it appears the root cause of all poor behavior. My own explanation is a simpler one and you must agree with me, Cass, even you who has not a bad word for anyone: the thrill of being Mrs. James Austen has quite gone to her head.”
“Well…” Cassy thought for a moment, and found she could not disagree. “I suppose she is very happy to be married to James. And, perhaps, for the moment, yes, a little